"Wake up! Please! Wake up..." Raphtalia cried, shaking Yagi's unconscious body in hopes that he was still alive.
Raphtalia held Yagi's hand tightly as tears ran down her cheeks, cursing herself for being so weak, wishing she could've been of better assistance to the other heroes. To make matters worse, she saw a group of knights approaching the devastated landscape.
"There they are! The heroes!" One of the knights shouted.
"There's somebody else! Stand guard!" Another knight said.
"Don't take another step! I won't let you hurt them! I won't fail them again!" Raphtalia said in tears, pointing her sword at the knights.
"Ease yourself, child. We're not here to cause harm to anyone, you have my word." Said a female with purple hair and eyes. The feature that made her stand out so much, however, was the crown and fancy dress that she wore.
Raphtalia still wasn't sure to trust the woman, but she did lower her guard slightly, just enough to say "I'll trust you, but don't make any funny moves." without actually speaking. As she took the promise with caution.
"Bring the heroes back to the castle, they need to be healed and fast." The woman said, signaling the knights to pick them up and bring them to the carriages.
After hearing what she had heard, Raphtalia had a little more trust in these mysterious knights and crowned lady, but there was still some doubt in their claims. Raphtalia was snapped out of her thinking when she heard she was mentioned.
"What about the demi-human child?" Asked one of the knights, pointing at Raphtalia.
"Bring her along as well, she might know what happened here." the woman said.
It took some convincing, but Raphtalia complied. She got in the carriage where Yagi lays in, taking a seat next to him. Sometime later, everyone arrived at the castle where the heroes were laid in beds, followed by healing magic experts to get them in a better condition quickly. Meanwhile, Raphtalia was taken by the woman to a room for answers to the questioning. The two of them sat together, with tea on hand to put both of them on better terms.
"When did you find the heroes? We have been searching for them for months." The woman asked.
"About for a week now, when I was saved by the hero with the daggers, Todoroki." Raphtalia explained.
The inquiries continued:
"Did any of the heroes have any connections to this village?"
"A few merchants and the blacksmith. Erhard, I think that was his name."
"Where have the heroes been taking refuge?"
"It varied, though it was always somewhere in the forest."
"What did you do with the heroes the week you found them?"
"They trained me to help them with their quests."
With all those questions answered, there was only one left. The most important question at hand.
"What caused the heroes to destroy the landscape back when we found them?" The woman asked.
Raphtalia paused for a moment. "It was a monster the priest created back in the church, made to kill the heroes. The hammer hero, Deku, told me to run after we had escaped from the church shortly after. Then, I felt an impact, along with the gust of wind that pushed me forward a bit." She replied.
The woman was about to ask something else, but a few knocks on the door stopped her. "Hello? Your majesty, the heroes are fully healed. The shield hero is currently the only one awake at the moment." A man said from outside.
"I'll be there in a moment. Follow me, miss..?" The woman said, asking for Raphtalia's name.
"Raphtalia." She replied.
"Right, let's go see your mentors." The woman said, extending her hand for Raphtalia.
Raphtalia grabbed her hand, leaving the room as the woman lead her through the castle to the room where the heroes rested. Raphtalia rushed over to Yagi and jumped over to his bed.
"Mr. Toshinori! You're okay!" Raphtalia said, crying tears of joy as she embraced him in a tight hug.
"Haha! I'm happy to see you again as well, Raphtalia!" Yagi said, returning Raphtalia's hug as he wrapped his right arm around her.
The woman simply smiled at the display of care by both teacher and pupil. Yagi then noticed her.
"May I know what's going on in here?" Yagi asked.
"Ah, right. Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Mirellia Q Melromarc, the queen of Melromarc. We found your body laying on the ground along with the other six heroes, so we brought you back to the castle to help with your recovery." The queen explained.
The rest of the heroes started to wake up, with Todoroki being the first to speak. Having heard what the queen said, he introduced himself.
"I'm assuming that you already know the names of the other three over there, so I'll introduce myself and my friends. I'm Shoto Todoroki, the green-haired one is Izuku Midoriya, and the blonde is Katsuki Bakugo." He said, pointing to each person as he named them.
"And I'm assuming that you heard the conversation me and your teacher had, but I'll introduce myself once more time for your friends to hear. My name is Mirellia Q Melromarc, the queen of Melromarc." As she said this, she noticed that Motoyasu quickly went from looking tired to angry, almost pissed.
"Where is that damn king!? I want a few words with him..." Motoyasu said in a threatening tone as he slowly raised his spear.
"Calm down now, young Motoyasu. We don't want any more troubles with the kingdom that we already have." Yagi said, as a drop of sweat trickled down his forehead, geeling Motoyasu's bloodlust.
"May I remind you that he and that other woman accused you of sexual assault the third day we got here?" Itsuki said, awakening another aura of bloodlust. Everyone except the queen instantly knew where it came from. Bakugo.
"He did WHAT!? I'll kill that bastard too! He's getting a one-way ticket to hell along with that damn priest!" Bakugo yelled, sparking explosions on his palms.
"You may be happy to know that my husband and daughter Malty, have been... Dealt with appropriately..." Mirellia said, sounding ominous in that last part.
"They better pray I don't find them or else I..." Motoyasu cursed, being stopped by Ren before he could continue.
"Well, what's next?" Itsuki asked, curious to know whether there are any more waves to deal with.
"About that, because of the incident that the priest caused back in the forest, the waves have now calmed down and will not appear again for a century at least. This means that all of you will be returned to your respective worlds and be substituted by other people once the waves appear again." Mirellia said.
"Wait, can't we just stay here?" Motoyasu asked, not wanting to leave this world as he had developed a strong fondness for his companions, seeing them as friends and his teacher as an adoptive father.
"As much as I wish that was the case, it unfortunately isn't. There's a condition that has to be complied with in order for the summoning that was used to send you here to work, and that is that once the waves are dealt with by the heroes, they shall be returned to their original world immediately." Mirellia said.
"I suppose we have no choice then." Itsuki said, getting up from his bed with a bleak look on his face.
"All of you meet me at the throne room for a proper farewell, take all the time you need to say goodbye to everyone you need, just make sure it's today." The queen said as she left the room.
The seven heroes sat in silence, none of them knew what to say. Yagi was without a doubt saddened to lose his new students. Even if it was just a few months, he cared for them as if he had known them for years. Even though he was glad to hear he would return to his original world, it still left him sorrowful.
"Since no one wants to be the first to speak, I'll do it. I enjoyed the time I spent with all of you, even if some of you arrived just a week ago. It's a shame that we'll go back to our worlds and possibly never see each other ever again. But even then, I won't forget anything we spent our time together on, it's been a fun adventure..." Itsuki said, having tears in his eyes.
"I'm going to be honest with you all, I did not have any intentions of creating any type of association with any of you the moment we got summoned here. However, the more I got to know you all, the more I realized that I couldn't isolate myself from interacting with other people without getting a better idea of how they can be. And I'm glad that out of all of the people, it was you guys." Ren said, crossing his arms and smiling.
"I gotta admit, looking at myself from the past and how I am now, I deserve a slap across the face, especially with the misunderstanding with Raphtalia and Todoroki. But thanks to all of you, I managed to mostly move past the things that admittedly made me a bit of a douche. Oh, and sorry if I gave you all a scare when I faked being against Sensei, I also deserve to get slapped for that, heh." Motoyasu said, smirking like a little kid who had gotten away with something.
"I feel the same as Itsuki, it only took one day for me to warm up to you guys. One week was more than enough to get to know all of you are great people I'd be more than willing to be heroes with!" Deku added, raising his fist upwards.
"Similarly to Ren, I didn't trust any of you besides Midoriya, Bakugo, and All Might. Still, I think you're people with a lot of potential, cardinal weapons or not. Not to mention, your knowledge of video games is what gave you the advantage over us. And you were of great help when fending off the bosses of the waves." Todoroki commented.
"Tch, I'll give it to you. You're kinda strong if you handled those weirdos by yourselves. But don't think for a second that you're better than me! ...I still wouldn't care if any of you were one of the other extras at UA..." Bakugo muttered.
"What young Bakugo is trying to say here, is that you would be excellent additions to UA's hero course. And I agree with that statement, you have the potential to be pro heroes, you would absolutely make the top 10 of the list!" Yagi said, sporting his signature smile.
"Well, I think it's time we head to the throne room." Itsuki said, having said all he needed to.
They all stood up and headed towards the throne room, passing many others on their way there. A portal was waiting for them at the entrance of the throne room, and soon they were all standing before it.
"I guess this is the last goodbye, huh?" Motoyasu said, turning to see the other heroes.
"Yep, it is." Itsuki said, taking one last look at his friends and mentor.
"Well, it was good to know you all. Until we see each other again." Deku said, offering a handshake to the three teens.
Itsuki was the one to take his hand, smiling gently. Then, the handshake went from a hug.
Ren was shy to join, but as this might be the last time he sees them, he hugged everyone as well with Todoroki being the second-to-last one to join. The only one left was Bakugo, who was unwillingly pulled into the hug by Yagi. He didn't want to admit it, but it felt a little nice.
"Let me go, dammit!" Bakugo said, pushing himself away from the pile, as everyone let go some seconds after. Everyone stepped towards the portal, being stopped by the queen.
"One more thing before you go, shield hero." She said, before planting a kiss on Yagi's cheek, making him blush. This was the first time he had received one that wasn't just for his fame or reputation as the number one hero in Japan.
Without another word, he stepped into the portal with the others. He would finally go back to his world after months of slaying monsters and helping villages along with his squad of students.
"Um... Your majesty? I don't want to ruin the mood, but there was a mistake made with the portal." Said one of the summoners, catching the attention of everyone.
"What?! Bring them back! We don't know where they could have gone to!" The queen panicked.
"I'm afraid that's not going to be possible, we can only summon them once and return them once. A second summoning is not happening even if we tried." Explained the summoner, worrying the queen even more.
Whatever is that happened, hopefully it's nothing bad...